Ryan Vail Set for London After Jury Duty Delayed

Top American at the 2013 NYC Marathon will have to serve in May.

Ryan Vail, the top American at the 2013 New York City Marathon, is cleared to go to the London Marathon on April 13 as planned after getting a deferral on his jury duty summons from Oregon’s Multnomah County.

Vail was summoned by the county to appear for jury duty on April 10, Runner's World Newswirereported earlier this month. He is scheduled to leave for Europe on April 3, first going to his wife's family home in Prague. However, he let the world know via Twitter:

The excuse that I'll be out of the country for the London Marathon was denied for jury duty...guess they'll have to arrest me when I return.

Vail told Newswire earlier this month, “I requested deferral, and I got a letter back a few days ago in the mail saying they were going to deny my request and I had to show up on my original date.” But he had further communication with Multnomah officials who told him he "needed to send in a second letter, basically with the same information from the first, I suppose, and documentation supporting it." He also had to list ten specific dates when he could do jury duty after he returned from Europe.

On March 14, Vail Tweeted, “No chance of missing the marathon. I'm working with the county courthouse on it.” And then yesterday, Ken Goe of The Oregonian reported that Vail had told him he was “all clear for now” to go to London and that his jury summons is deferred until May.

Vail ran a career best of 2:11:45 in Fukuoka in 2012. On February 23, he defeated Abdi Abdirahman to win the Gasparilla Distance Classic half marathon in Tampa. As he said in regard to a form attached to his original summons to appear on April 10, “you have a box to check that says ‘this will cause me financial hardship,’ and I explained ‘this will be a big percentage of my yearly income, so I can’t afford to miss this.’” Now, he won’t miss it.